Mineral Beneficiation

Uganda is endowed with a vast array of minerals: Precious Metals like gold, silver, and platinum occur in all regions of Uganda. Over 80% of the country has been surveyed for mineral quantities and locations. New geo-data shows that Uganda has large under-exploited mineral deposits of gold, oil, high grade tin, tungsten/wolfram, salt, beryllium, cobalt, kaolin, iron-ore, glass sand, vermiculite , phosphates (agricultural fertilizer), Uranium and rare earth elements.

There are also significant quantities of clay and gypsum. Gold occurs in many areas of the country, including Busia in the east, Buhweju and Kigezi in the west, Mubende – Kiboga in the central region and significant occurrences in Karamoja in the north east.

There are over 200 million tonnes proven reserves of iron ore (haematite) in South West Uganda and over 100 million tonnes of (magnetite) have been explored in South East Uganda; Rare Earth Elements (REE) potential exist in Isolated pegmatites in South West Uganda; there are Carbonatite centres in Eastern Uganda and Aluminous clays in Makuutu area (South East Uganda); Base metals, including Copper, Cobalt, Lead, Zinc, PGMs occur in all regions of Uganda; the 3Ts [Tin, Tantalite (coltan) & Tungsten] are found In South West and Central Uganda; Industrial Minerals i.e. Dimension stones (Marble and Granite) and Glass sand occur in all regions of Uganda.

There are 10 targets for Uranium that are priority for detailed exploration; the geothermal potential in Uganda is estimated at 1,500 MW. The 5 key geothermal prospects are found in the Western Rift Valley. Most of Uganda’s mining and mineral processing facilities are privately owned, including the cement and steel plants, the lead refinery, and the vermiculite mine.

Reserves of crude petroleum were estimated to be 2.5 billion barrels in the Lake Albertine Basin and reserves of natural gas are estimated at 14 billion cubic meters.

Uganda is also endowed with plenty of Renewable Energy Resources which is still untapped especially solar, wind and mini hydro power resources. The demand for electricity is very high with the electrification rate of about 22%. There is high demand for off grid power projects to supply power to areas far away from the grid

The viability of off grid /standalone solar home systems is high. There is also a huge regional market for power including Southern Sudan, East DRC, Rwanda and Burundi. In Uganda, about 5 million rural homes that need solar electricity. Uganda experiences high solar radiation of 5.1KW/m2/day, in addition there are tax exemptions on all solar products.

Investment opportunities exist in mining and mineral processing. Uganda provides special incentives to the mining sector with some capital expenditures being written off in full.

The Uganda Mining Act of 2003 and Mining Regulation 2004 grant five types of mining rights. These include:

PROJECTS FOR INVESTMENT

The Government of Uganda is promoting the use of renewable energy sources as alternatives or supplements to other traditional sources like hydropower, and fossil fuels (oil and gas). Geothermal Energy is being given serious consideration amongst other renewable sources of energy as a base- load producer of electricity.
Buranga geothermal prospect located at Sempaya, Bwamba Road, Bundibugyo District, West-Uganda is one of the potential areas for geothermal exploration and development. The prefeasibility studies done at Buranga geothermal prospect indicate subsurface temperatures of approximately 150 – 200˚C. The temperatures are suitable for electricity production and direct use in industry and agriculture.
GIDS Consult Limited is currently carrying out exploration and evaluation of geothermal energy with an aim of developing at least 100 MW Geothermal Power Plant at Buranga prospect. The company is planning to drill 3 deep exploration/production wells at the prospect and develop a 30 MW well-head geothermal power plant units at each successful wells. The company shall develop a 100 MW geothermal power plant.

The Kamalenge gold mining project is owned by AUC Mining (U) Ltd and is a mining and exploration project covering 6 square kilometers’; with a mining lease and 1400 square kilometers’ under exploration licenses. Four (4) magnetic lineaments have been defined so far.

The project areas are three gold exploration and development targets. Busia has been explored the most. Drilling has taken place in all proper- ties – as well as detailed geochemistry, geophysics, pitting, and trenching. Based on assessment of independent consultants, a resource of 600,000 to 800,000 ounces of gold is estimated for Busia to the 150m depth.